February 15, 2007 — (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Web hosting provider Affinity Internet (affinity.com) announced on Tuesday the grand prize winner and overall success of its advergame, ServerMechanic.
ServerMechanic is an online flash game created to build brand awareness of Gate.com. The free IT-focused game tested players’ technical prowess in a four-level online competition and players vied for an array of big prizes, including Xbox 360, the popular Gears of War game, free domain names, free hosting and a grand prize of an LCD flat-screen HD-TV.
Over the duration of the contest, thousands of unique visitors played ServerMechanic and a 63.9 percent of that traffic was obtained virally, says Affinity. At the end of the competition, the grand prize winner with the best overall time was Aaron Southern from Calera, Alabama who completed all four levels in 13:07 seconds, 94 seconds faster than the runner up.
“We were enthused to see that ServerMechanic, which we had such a good time creating, was also entertaining and rewarding to so many visitors,” says Jim Collins, CEO of Affinity. “The game achieved our goal to amuse and reward the IT workers of the world, while also introducing them to our brand. The result was a cost effective, innovative approach to driving market share, customer loyalty and brand recognition in an entertaining and engaging manner. It also provided Affinity with a new mechanism by which we can interact with our customers.”
